The present invention generally relates to a power supply through a single track of discrete electrodes, and more specifically to a medical instrument that comprises a power supply through a single track of discrete electrodes.
Many medical instruments, including some handheld instruments, are not powered, often in the instance where one portion of the instrument moves with respect to another portion of the instrument. This results in a “passive” device, or a passive portion of a device, that is, one that does not receive electrical energy or signals. This is true of some instruments used in endoscopy.
Endoscopy in the medical field allows internal features of the body of a patient to be viewed without the use of traditional, fully invasive surgery. Endoscopic imaging systems incorporate endoscopes to enable a user to view a surgical site, and endoscopic tools enable noninvasive surgery at the site. The endoscope is placed in the body at the location at which it is necessary to perform the surgical procedure. Other surgical instruments are also placed in the body at the surgical site. A surgeon views the surgical site through the endoscope in order to manipulate the instruments to perform the desired surgical procedure. The endoscopes may be used with a camera head for the purpose of processing the image data received by the endoscope.
Currently, endoscopes are passive devices that provide an illumination channel and a viewing channel. The endoscopes have a proximal eyepiece which is inserted into an optical coupler, which in turn is connected to the camera head. Alternatively, the endoscope may contain the optical coupling pieces internally and interface directly with the camera head. The interface between the endoscope and the coupler or camera head is mechanical in nature due to requirements of sterilization, stability, reliability, and rotation of the endoscope relative to the camera head. Moreover, the endoscope must be autoclavable, meaning that the design must be robust enough to accommodate high temperatures and high pressures encountered during a sterilization cycle. These requirements have resulted in the endoscope being a passive device. Electrically active instruments such as endoscopes would garner many advantages. However, due to the above-noted structural features, to date the commercially available endoscopes have not been made electrically active.
Another factor in designing an endoscopic system is that the endoscope and camera head connection is made and broken at least once per medical procedure, which leads to a large number of connections being made and broken over the lifetime of the endoscopic system. Therefore, an endoscope with both electrical and mechanical connections is preferably at least as reliable as the current mechanical-only arrangement. While keeping all of these factors in mind, the endoscopic arrangement must also be easily manipulated by the user and remain compact, with the endoscope being free to rotate with respect to the coupler or camera head.
The embodiments of the present invention address and solve these problems. In one embodiment, a medical device system has a first member and a second member, the first member including a plurality of electrical elements, and the second member including a plurality of electrical elements and a plurality of proximity sensors. The proximity sensors are preferably magnetic in nature. The distinct electrical elements of the second member are connected to a dynamically switchable electrical circuit, the circuit including the proximity sensors. Such a structure results in the members' electrical polarity capable of being dynamically switched based on the relative position of the opposing electrical elements of the respective members. This provides discrete electrical contact throughout 360° of rotation of one member relative to the other, regardless of orientation and initial configuration. The medical device system may be an endoscope and camera head arrangement.
This system permits a hermetic seal to be achieved and allows rotation of the members with respect to one another. The method of sensing proximity and position may employ the use of Hall Effect sensors, magneto-resistive sensors, through-load detection, capacitive sensing devices, or other proximity/positioning sensing devices or apparatus.
Other advantages, objects and/or purposes of the invention will be apparent to persons familiar with constructions of this general type upon reading the following specification and inspecting the accompanying drawings.